Conventionally, systems have been proposed to reserve a taxi using a mobile device (refer to “URL:https://hailoapp.com/” retrieved on-line on Jun. 23, 2015, and “URL:https://www.uber.com/” retrieved on-line on Jun. 23, 2015, for example). The mobile device having a built-in GPS (Global Positioning System) sends a ride request that includes current position information to a server, according to an input from a user. The server allocates the ride request to a vehicle that can most quickly pick up the user, and notifies a scheduled pick-up time to the mobile device. The reservation is validated when the user sends an acceptance notification from the mobile device to the server.
On the other hand, systems have been proposed to match ride requests that can share a ride at relatively low fares (refer to “URL:http://www.lyft.com/” retrieved on-line on Jun. 23, 2015, and “URL:http://www.side.cr/” retrieved on-line on Jun. 23, 2015, for example). The user sends to the server a ride-sharing request in which conditions such as a pick-up location, a drop-off location, preferred departure time window or a preferred arrival time window, or the like are specified. The server retrieves ride-sharing providers or other ride-sharing candidates having other ride requests that are similar time-wise and space-wise to the ride-sharing request, and presents the retrieved results containing candidates of the ride-sharing. The reservation is validated when the user sends the acceptance notification from the mobile device to the server. The ride-sharing includes a type that provides a door-to-door transportation means, and a type that boards and alights passengers at predetermined locations such as bus stops or the like.
A taxi service can only cope with a single ride request, and cannot cope with the demands in a time period in which the demands are at a peak, nor cope with a rapid increase in the demands due to sudden rain or the like. For this reason, the user must wait for a long time to board the taxi when the demands for the taxi are high, to thereby greatly deteriorate user satisfaction of the taxi service. Some users may discontinue using the taxi service as the user satisfaction of the taxi service deteriorates, which in turn results in missed opportunities for a taxi service provider to make profit.
On the other hand, the probability of validating the matching in a ride-sharing service becomes low as the demands for the ride-sharing decrease. Further, when the matching is forcibly validated in the case in which the demands for the ride-sharing are low, the profit of a provider of the ride-sharing service decreases.
On the other hand, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2014-238831, for example, proposes a system to improve the profit of the service provider or the user satisfaction of the service. This proposed system dynamically allocates the same vehicle to a plurality of operation types such as the taxi, shared ride, or the like, according to the demands, so as to improve the profit of the service provider or the user satisfaction of the service.
However, the system proposed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2014-238831, for example, does not take future demands into consideration, and only aims to improve the profit from the current user who is making the ride request. For this reason, depending on the reservation of the current user, a shortage of the vehicles may occur in the future, and there is a possibility of missing opportunities to provide services to other users. As a result, a sum total of the profit of the service provider or the user satisfaction of the service deteriorates. For example, providing the taxi service to the current user may result in no more vehicles that can be allocated, and in this case, other users wishing to use the ride-sharing service in the future will be enable to receive this ride-sharing service.